Welcome to the 21st century. The Cold War, WWII, and WWI are over.The 19th and 20th centuries' class conflicts and colonial issues are behind us. "Oppressed proletariat" and "European expansionism" are no longer relevant. Religious fanatics want their beliefs to rule the world. Free people want to stay that way. Here's my view of the 21st century's great conflict -

Wednesday, January 16, 2008

Flight 93 Memorial - Why Isn't This an Issue?

The Flight 93 memorial in Pennsylvania is a cluster of coincidences. This memorial to the passengers and crew of Flight 93, who died while trying to regaining control of their airliner on September 11, 2001, just happens to:

And now, it seems that someone who criticized it has been fired: "Blogburst: Pentagon not the only department letting Muslims cover up terror threats." That post's lead paragraph reads: "The military’s top expert on jihad ideology was fired last week at the behest of a Muslim aide to Deputy Secretary of Defense Gordon England. The aide is a friend to the grand-daddy of all modern Islamic terror groups, the Muslim Brotherhood. His influence is penetration of the top levels of the Pentagon by our terror war enemies."

I'm not convinced that Paul Murdoch Architects' Flight 93 Memorial is a stealth mosque. On the other hand, I'm concerned that this peculiar set of coincidences, public knowledge for years, seems to be a non-issue.

I would have thought the possibility that a memorial to victims of Islamic terrorists being, in effect, a huge mosque, would be a newsworthy issue. Possible explanations include:

The use of an attackers' symbol in a war memorial (equivalent to a WWII American memorial having trees planted in the shape of a swastika) is such a trivial matter that it doesn't warrant attention

The matter has been discussed in the news media, back in 2005, and so is 'old news'

The desire of people in public positions to be seen as 'tolerant' is so strong, that any criticism of non-western symbols is literally unthinkable

In fairness, the Paul Murdoch Architects "FLIGHT 93 NATIONAL MEMORIAL" description (with pictures) looks very nice. Neither the pictures, nor the descriptions, seem to be particularly 'Islamic.' A feature that appealed to me was a tower containing 40 wind chimes. UpdateSeptember 11, 2008

Looking back on my posts on this topic, and the research I did, I still can't decide what was going on. Whether the designers were:

Tone-deaf to how people outside Los Angeles might react to a war memorial with a "crescent of embrace"

Unaware that the crescent was an important symbol in Islam

Thoughtlessly multicultural

Tools of Islamic radicals

Lucky - or unlucky - enough to have part of the memorial design pointed at Mecca

Or, some combination: maybe including points the list missed.

I'd be surprised if numbers 2 or 4 were right.

Islam is a major world religion, and it's about as likely that designers wouldn't know about the Islamic crescent, as that they wouldn't know that white is a color of mourning in Japan.

There may be tools of Islamic radicals in America, but the odds that a team of architects and designers, who were chosen to design the Flight 93 memorial, were also a team of Muslim secret agents can't be very high.

Numbers 1 and 3 aren't, I think, all that unlikely. People tend to know their own sub-cultures best, and sometimes have difficulty understanding how outsiders think and feel. In a way, I applaud what may have been an effort at inclusiveness. If the "crescent of embrace" was intended to reach out to Muslims who weren't trying to kill people they don't like, it represented a fine sentiment. And, one presented at the wrong time.

Bottom line? I doubt that the Flight 93 memorial is some kind of Islamic plot. I'm bothered by the goofy way the design was presented, and a little troubled by the alignment with Mecca, but weird coincidences do happen.

Americas Interests.blog
an Australian's perspective
(on January 29, 2009 the author announced the end of new posts, and explained his reasons for doing so. He is, however, keeping the 21 months of accumulated posts on line, because of "the role that it plays in a larger ecosystem of information" - I recommend AI as an archival resource. )

Blog 4 Human Rights: Human Rights in Georgia (the nation)
News, Opinions, Videos and Photos (Why blogroll this? Georgia is about 10% Muslim, very near the Middle East: and human rights is a critical part of the War on Terror.)

Defenders Council of Vermont
"...our mission is to educate the citizens of Vermont about the nature, reality and threat of radical Islam, deepen Vermonters' understanding of America's heritage, honor the men and women of the armed services and their families, and support the efforts of others to help our armed forces work with local populations in foreign lands."

DefenseLink Blogger's Roundtable
provides source material for stories in the blogosphere concerning the Department of Defense (DoD) by bloggers and online journalists.

FactCheck.org "aims to reduce the level of deception and confusion in U.S. politics". It's "a project of the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania". From what I've seen, this non-partisan website must be quite annoying to all sides

Islamic Circle of North America
"... to seek the pleasure of Allah (SWT) through the struggle of Iqamat-ud-Deen (establishment of the Islamic system of life) as spelled out in the Qur'an and the Sunnah of Prophet Muhammad (pbuh)"

Islamic Society of Central Florida (ISCF)
"...an organization which strives to serve the greater Central Florida community by catering to the social, religious, and educational needs of its Muslim inhabitants."

Muir S. Fairchild Research Information Center
A research resource for United States Air Force Air University students, "provided as a public service by Muir S. Fairchild Research Information Center and the Maxwell Support Division."

Muslims Against Sharia An organization of Muslims, presumably dedicated "...to educate non-Muslims about the differences between moderate Muslims and Islamists..." - with a curious way of practicing Peace, Love Light, (words in their website's logo).

1 Given a recent misunderstanding of the phrase "useful resources," a clarification: I do not limit my reading to resources which support my views, or even to those which appear to be accurate. Reading opinions contrary to what I believed has been very useful at times: sometimes verifying my previous assumptions, sometimes encouraging me to change them.

Even resources which, in my opinion, are simply inaccurate are sometimes useful: these can give valuable insights into why some people or groups believe what they do.

In short, It is my opinion that some of the resources in this blogroll are neither accurate, nor unbiased. I do, however, believe that they are useful in understanding the War on Terror, the many versions of Islam, terrorism, and related topics.

The Blogger

Brian, aka Aluwir, aka Nanoc, aka Norski
I'm a married guy, over 50, with four kids in a small central Minnesota town. Despite what's in my Blogger profile's "Interests" section, I'm only interested in three things:

* What exists in the universe
* What exists beyond
* What might exist

My background in history; a checkered work history, and guardedly hopeful attitude toward human goofiness, is off the fiftieth percentile: whether above, below, or to the side, I'm not sure.

It's a different perspective: and one which I believe sets this blog apart from most blogs dealing with this conflict.